Rockin' at the Hotel Cafe

In long-distance celebration of my brother's birthday (Well, mainly out of coincidence, but Happy Birthday, Ethan!), we went to the Hotel Cafe for a great [sold out!] concert.

Sara Bareilles was the headliner, and her voice - especially live - is A-MAZING. Wide range with perfect tone and pitch. And she has personality to boot! I was especially excited to see that Tony Lucca was one of the opening performers (as my previous post would support), and it was a treat when Sara and Tony sang together at the end.

I highly recommend seeing either artist in concert - their passions in playing and singing are best heard in person. :)



We were actually closer to the stage in the tiny venue than my blurry phone pictures would depict...

Lighten up

This short article struck me as "right on"... I know I overreact to things that ultimately don't matter. I especially like this part of the piece:

...your spouse does something objectionable. And you get angry. You say, "I can't believe you did that." Here's the thing: The angry part is always about you. It doesn't matter how in the right you think you are, how in the right you may actually be. The fact that it bothers you so much — that's your problem. I can't tell you how much I wish it were otherwise, but it's true.

So... awkward...

The more I see of his weird behavior, the more I believe that it's all a hoax.

Strong Apes = Dumped by Entertainment Industry

Remember these posts? If further proof of why apes shouldn't be used in advertising is needed, here is what became of one of the CareerBuilder chimps...

(Thanks, Ida, for passing along the article.)

Living in L.A. means...

...I spent 2 1/2 hours in traffic during a drive yesterday that should've taken 20 minutes.

...when Leah and I took a walk at a local park, a film crew was set up along the sidewalk and middle grassy area shooting a commercial. (Look for guys playing football outside when you next see a Coors commercial.)

...$22 at a locally-run produce/deli shop can buy fresh white onions, two kinds of lettuce, apples, oranges, Italian parsley, grapefruit, tomatoes, mushrooms, blueberries, green onions, avocado, carrots, two kinds of potatoes, a jar of roasted red peppers, a bag of sliced almonds, and chocolate-covered pretzels (the last one isn't healthy, I know)!

...Jon and I will be seatfillers for the third year in a row at the SAG (Screen Actors' Guild) Awards show in a week (Sunday, January 25th).

RIP Earl

About this time two years ago, Jon and I brought two $2.99-each, "fancy" goldfish into our home, Jazzy and Earl. Jazzy didn't last long, nor did Dart, nor did Franklin (the two goldfish friends we bought for Earl after each one subsequently died). We weren't sure if Earl was killing off his "friends" or if he had some deadly disease afflicting his tank-mates... After Franklin, we decided Earl needed to live alone for awhile. He didn't seem to mind, as this meant all the food went to him. He would always get especially excited when you talked to him - his body would wriggle expectantly to the top of the water.

Well, Earl started having some health issues. We tried about four different "tank" situations - first just a round bowl, then a fancy filtered set-up tank, then a large hurricane glass, then just a shallow glass bowl. He would get sick, we'd remove him from the tank and thoroughly clean it, and continue to medicate him in a shallow plastic tupperware. He'd recover, and we'd put him into a pre-medicated tank. He'd inevitably get sick again, and we'd repeat the process. His final "tank" was the shallow glass bowl, as it seemed to most closely mimic his environment in the plasticware in which he best recuperated.

Today Jon informed me of the news we had anticipated for the past several months - Earl was dead.

I have to say, after all of this, goldfish are MUCH more high maintanence than hermit crabs. We spent money on fish aquarium set-ups, food and antibiotics, and spent cumulative hours cleaning and fretting over our $2.99 fish. My hermit crabs only require water, food, and the occasional wettened sand and cleaning. But sometimes I forget they're even there - and they're fine. Happily surviving without issues. I think we will be a fish-less family for awhile now.

Rest in peace, Earl - well-fed in your warm, spacious pond in the sky. Maybe with other goldfish friends... unless you had been killing them because you prefer to be a loner.

Seen the new Bond movie?

We did last Friday. It was entertaining, though not as good as Casino Royale. I think the difference came from the director change between movies and seemingly-less witty banter. Quantum of Solace is mostly just action sequences with a plot that relies heavily on how much you remember about Casino.

I saw a red-carpet picture today of the "Bond girl" Olga Kurylenko from Quantum, and I didn't believe it was the same person... Judge for yourself:



They made her a different ethnicity!